


To Grant God Absolution

by MlleMusketeer



Category: The Transformers (IDW Generation One), Transformers - All Media Types
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, M/M, The happy ending universe, what to do when your boyfriend turns out to be god and also not dead
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-28
Updated: 2020-02-28
Packaged: 2021-02-28 01:21:13
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,831
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22945441
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MlleMusketeer/pseuds/MlleMusketeer
Summary: "I can't grant you absolution," Rung says. It's not a chastisement. It's an admission of guilt. Megatron slides to his knees, easy as breathing, and takes the other bot's hand in his own."That's not why I'm here."
Relationships: Megatron/Rung (Transformers)
Comments: 14
Kudos: 156





	To Grant God Absolution

**Author's Note:**

> Title and in-text quotation from Terry Pratchett.

They find him on a rocky planetoid in the new universe, and he smiles serenely through all of the confusion, all of the scans, Ratchet's certainty that he must be more scraplets, an illusion, Rodimus shrugging and saying, "Well, we've definitely seen weirder shit," Megatron staring at him half-wondering, half-insulted; sacrifices should be permanent.

His arm even has the break where Cyclonus plowed into him, the same mends from Ratchet's hands. His helm bears the scars of Swerve's misaimed shot. He even has his glasses, and seeing him a veil over their memories lifts. "But the Matrixes," says Magnus, puzzled, and Whirl won't stop staring.

They know his name now. It comes easily to their minds, confidently to the glossa, and Rung is silent throughout, gently smiling with an edge under the surface, until there's a lull in the conversation and he slips a comment in, quiet as he's always been, except this time it stops them all in their tracks and the whole room leans in as if the very walls are listening.

"Do you know what a universal constant is?" he asks gently.

Brainstorm does. Perceptor does. Megatron listens with half an audial, his optics still on the mech who he knows to be dead at home, whose last act was to save everyone Megatron failed to save, and make it clear in the same gesture that he is irredeemable. The mech he once loved.

It's gutting to think about.

Still more so because he is sure Rung was right, to refuse him that. He had no right to hope for it. He never believed in Primus, raged against him. What god would set in motion such a cruel system? What god would condone the abuse of His children in His name?

And this is the mech—maybe _entity_ is a better word for it—that Megatron has pulled to himself, to his spark. Has yielded to, a thing he's avoided for so so many eons, untrusting, refusing to indulge. The mech he loved is the very god whose strictures he's spent his life fighting, and that mech's last action in this world made it clear that despite what they had, he sees Megatron as unworthy.

 _Used._ Used would describe the way he feels. Even if Rung is right. Even if he has no right to feel that way, because he's sure there are some things that should never be forgiven. But his years in the Functionist Universe have made it clear that it's not only his own actions that fall into that category.

He avoids Rung. He turns inward, as he always does.

The people who matter most to him surround him. He has a life. What more can he ask? What does the arrival of a wayward god signify? Nothing. It should mean nothing. He does not _need_ the mercy of a god whose wrongs he has sought to undo for the ways he strayed, unguided, in that undoing.

This lasts only as long as he avoids Rung.

"Megatron," says Rung from behind him, one day, and Megatron finds he doesn't have the strength to ignore him. He stops, frozen. It must seem to Rung that he means to wait.

"In the last two days I have spoken with every mechanism on this ship save you. Even Nickel, who mostly sees me as someone she can bully without needing to use her jetpack. You're avoiding me."

"I wonder why," Megatron says.

Rung sighs heavily and moves closer to him. Like he expects Megatron to run. Or to fight. Megatron's fists clench and he closes his optics. Rung must see the danger signs, but he keeps moving closer. As if he trusts Megatron not to hurt him, and why should he do that? Of recent there's been little enough trust between them, that much is sure.

The Matrix wouldn't open for him, alone of all the crew, and he knows that is only just, that he has no right to resent it and yet he does, because it shows that the one mech he was willing to bare himself to thinks he's irredeemable. And that hurts. It's part of the price he has to pay, he knows that, but it fragging hurts and he doesn't know if he can deal with Rung like this.

"You gave me a great deal of trust," says Rung softly. "More than you have gifted any other mech with since you were much younger. Since you could write."

Megatron flinches at that, a gentle hand on a memory scraped raw. "Don't."

Rung waits, the huff of his vents quiet. Megatron knows that if he were to look down, Rung would meet his optics with understanding and inquiry.

He doesn't look down. He does speak, and he shouldn't, but he can't help it. "We both know you think I'm irredeemable," he says. "Why waste your time?"

"Because I care about you deeply."

"You care about everyone deeply. That's your fragging job. You're a god."

"Yes and no." Rung's gaze is heavy in a new way. Not the way Megatron's accustomed to, when they're in private, where it was scorching, promising. No. This is simply heavy, like a hand on the nape of his neck. An almost-threat, a threat from anyone else, a thing that has him tense around Rung who was—was a lover, was trusted. Was. The sound of the past tense like a closing door.

"Why do you think I believe you're irredeemable?"

"The Matrix would not open for me," says Megatron. "It was part of you—what other conclusion would you have me draw? A god I do not believe in thinks I cannot be saved. Wasn't that a constant of the priests? That all of us can be saved? And yet here we are."

"I didn't intend them as a form of judgement," says Rung. "I only wanted to save the planet. To save all those sparks."

Megatron laughs, sharp and bitter. "And what do you think I spent all those years doing, all that time in the Functionist Universe, picking up where that version of you left off? I was trying to save all those sparks and I failed. And I failed. And I failed. And then when you stepped in, when you sacrificed yourself for them again, I was denied even having a small part in saving them because my hands are too bloodied, too befouled, to wreak anything but _death._ What other message would you have me take from that but the final judgement of a god I didn't even believe in? Or a lover I shouldn't have taken?" He turns his head decisively away. Begins to walk. "And if you're wondering which is worse—it's the latter, Rung. It will always be the latter."

For a moment, he thinks he'll get away with this. Stalk away from Rung and leave him, let him start his new life here without him and never, never have to look his own failure in the face again. His decision to stand trial back in his proper universe, the fact they should have left him behind and didn't, the way he feels like he cheated his way into this new future—they're all tied back to that. He went to save a universe and he was unworthy and he _failed_ , and the mech he loved as good as told him. He wanted to stand trial, he wanted to die because what the frag else was he supposed to do? He'd tried to find redemption through action and what had it gotten him?

More ghosts for his recharge.

"Megatron— _Megatron!_ "

It's the sound in Rung's voice that stops him dead, pain and desperation that are the echo of his own. It brings him up short, stops him between one step and another and makes him turn to look at Rung.

"That's not how they worked," the small mech says, agonized. "My dear—they were never meant to work like that! It wasn't a judgement. Not on you."

"Explain," Megatron says, stamping down his own brittle hope.

"You don't believe in gods, or matrices, or redemption," Rung tells him. "You don't believe in being good enough. You believe in doing the job in front of you. I never thought you needed that reassurance, Megatron, because you would continue to work toward something better regardless. The others—it matters to them in a way that it doesn't—I didn't think it did, at least—to you." Rung steps a little closer. "You just wanted to save them. You'd given up on being a hero. You just wanted to make it come out right and I didn't think you _needed_ that proof. Rodimus did. Rodimus always has. Standing in the shadow of Optimus Prime gnaws at him and I needed to put that endless uncertainty to rest. But you…"

He pauses, looking up at Megatron.

Megatron stares down at him, the pain easing, feeling like he's only seeing the mortal nature of the wound he was dealt as it closes, at least a little.

"You have done terrible things," Rung says softly. "You have a long path to walk to redemption; all your life, it will take, and all your spark. But the opening of a Matrix was not part of it. Tell me, had it opened for you—would it have made a difference to your spark? Or would it have meant nothing, against the weight of your sin?"

Megatron knows the answer, looks away from him.

"There you are," says Rung. Megatron could hate him for thinking that would settle it, but then he says, "I didn't think it would hurt you so badly. I am sorry."

The last of the anger drains from Megatron, leaving him exhausted. Grieved as the small mech standing, looking up at him.

"I can't grant you absolution," Rung says. It's not a chastisement. It's an admission of guilt. "That's not how this works. Not for you." He laughs, small and sad. "I know you wouldn't accept it. And what god's hands are not drenched with energon as yours are? What god is not as steeped in sin as you? As soon as mecha make us something more than they, we become something terrible." A vent. "There's a human writer I loved. 'And sin, young man, is when you treat people like things. Including yourself.' We are both guilty of that."

Something is unraveling in Megatron's chest, all at once, a chain reaction he could not stop if he wanted to.

"I can't grant you absolution," says Rung, and reaches for him.

Megatron slides to his knees, easy as breathing, and takes the other bot's hand in his own.

"That's not what I need," he says. "Not from you."

Rung folds up too, tucks himself like he's transforming into the space of Megatron's arms, his helm resting against the cables of Megatron's throat.

"Nor I from you," he says. "Though I feel the need for it as keenly."


End file.
